


Think Good Thoughts

by diefleder_tey



Category: Arashi (Band)
Genre: Dark, Gen, Horror
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-11-26
Updated: 2011-11-26
Packaged: 2017-10-26 14:12:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,019
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/284197
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/diefleder_tey/pseuds/diefleder_tey
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>OCD's a pain, isn't it?  MatsuJun comes home one night to find a spot on his carpet that hijacks his life.  <i>Out, damned spot! Out, I say!</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	Think Good Thoughts

**Author's Note:**

> Exchange fic written for pot-and-kettle for 2010's [**je_squickfic**](http://je-squickfic.livejournal.com).

He had no idea how the spot got there, what it was or how he hadn’t seen it before. It wasn’t that big and it was particularly non-descript, as most stains went – it could have been the result of any number of things. Maybe there was a leak in the ceiling. Maybe he had accidentally spilled something when crossing the room earlier with food. Maybe something had been stuck to the bottom of a slipper or sock. Or it was mold. Or discoloration from the carpet fibers wearing out. Or even the consequence of all-night drinking with friends. Any number of things could have explained the mystery of the spot, but none of them really did.

Truth was, Matsumoto Jun was probably the messiest neat person he knew. Everything had its place in his apartment, even if that meant piles of clothes or stacks of DVDs. It looked disastrous at times, especially when his work schedule was at its busiest, but it was organized chaos – he knew exactly where everything was. Clutter may have contrasted with his sometimes neurotic tendency to point out smudges elsewhere, but it wasn’t dirt or specifically lack of cleanliness that really bothered him. It had more to do with what was out of place.

And the spot on the carpet on the floor between his kitchen and living room was certainly out of place. Out of place and completely unauthorized.

He had stumbled into his apartment that night, after being out with friends, and almost walked straight to his bedroom without flipping on the light. He had almost decided that he was far too tired, or drunk, or both, to bother even making it to the bed. But Jun pushed through the post-fun laziness and that’s when the spot caught his attention, just out of the corner of his eye.

“What is that?” he muttered, bending down to look at it. Since he didn’t have an answer and it was now past 3 a.m., Jun decided that, for the moment, he didn’t actually care. It could wait until tomorrow.

He had been yawning all the way home and now, after hastily doing the bare minimum necessary, he gladly rolled into his bed, exhaling with satisfaction and with an expectation to be asleep within minutes.

It never really worked that way for him, though. He knew other people in the agency who could fall asleep instantly no matter where they were. He didn’t know if he was jealous of that or not; it was obnoxious to take so long to wind down, but it did afford him the best opportunity to think.

And his thought process was as automatic as sleep itself – as his breathing slowed and his muscles started to relax, he thought about the next day’s schedule and whether or not he had what he wanted to eat for breakfast and the deeper meaning in something he had read earlier. Everything that had been put on the back burner during his daily routine was now at the front of his mind.

He had once read that human beings could simultaneously hold seven different thoughts, but he wasn’t sure if it was true – or at least true for him. Every time he tried counting them, it quickly derailed into thinking about how someone _could_ actually count such a thing. But there were usually at least a couple of songs running through his head, the awareness of what he was doing, a thought about what he should be doing instead…

And, on that night, the spot.

Jun rolled his eyes and then turned over in bed. Did it need repeating? Cleaning up the stain could wait until tomorrow, when it was lighter. That only made sense – after all, maybe in the daylight, after sleep, there wouldn’t be a stain at all. He was nothing if not stubborn and he was adamant about staying in bed and ignoring it until the next day. It simply wasn’t worth the effort that late at night.

Half an hour later, Jun was staring at his wall, clutching onto his pillow and still thinking about the spot.

***

He was as attentive as he could be, but more than one person had already pointed out that he looked a little more ragged than usual. Jun’s body had finally won out over his brain sometime around 5 a.m., but it resulted in him oversleeping and not sleeping enough. He came into the TBS studio slightly grumpy, but put it to the side in the name of professionalism.

And he tried to put his obvious fatigue aside as well as the VIP female guest rattled on about her particular taste in men. It wasn’t that he found her boring; in fact, Jun generally liked to listen to the guests. Nothing revolutionary was ever said, but he liked hearing the minor things that made other celebrities human. It would have been easy to space-out for the entire segment, but instead he tried his best to stay on top of the conversation.

“Do you know what’s also good?” she said, looking at each member of Arashi in turn. “I like a guy who can fall well.”

“Fall well?” Sho asked.

She stood up. “You know, sometimes when you’re walking, your shoe gets caught or it falls off or you hit a bump, right?” She took a few steps across the stage and lifted her right foot up, curling it behind her and pointing the stiletto as best she could. “How a man reacts to that is very important.”

“What’s a good way to fall?”

The guest leaned forward on one leg and swung the other across, spinning around as if the entire move had been on purpose. “Not necessarily that,” she commented, giggling as she sat back down. “But just recovering well. Making a big deal out of it is no good. I can’t stand guys who trip and then laugh and draw attention to it.”

“I got it,” Aiba said, jumping up. “So something like this.” He started at one end of the stage and slowed down in front of her before finishing at the other.

“You didn’t even trip,” Nino pointed out.

“Sorry,” Aiba apologized, laughing and running back to the center. “I couldn’t figure out how.” He tried walking again and this time purposely hooked his right foot behind his left calf on a step, stumbling forward. He regained his balance quickly and finished the walk, desperately trying to bite down on his amusement.

“Yes!” the guest exclaimed. “That’s exactly it!”

“Move out of the way, I got it, I got it,” Sho said, jumping up.

Aiba complied. But in his haste to get back to his seat, he hit his foot on something and went tumbling down right in front of Jun.

And that’s when Jun woke up completely.

He had seen Aiba land, embarrassed and waving his hand as he demonstrated the exact opposite of the guest’s ideal. He could see Aiba in front of him, not even his pride damaged.

And while he thought about how that was kind of typical Aiba, and how he was glad Aiba was alright, and how it was even humorous timing on Aiba’s part, a sneaky little image crept its way into Jun’s mind and nestled in amongst the other thoughts. In his head, he could see the whole event replayed; but this time Aiba rotated just a little when he came down. Rotated enough that his hand slipped when he stuck it out to catch himself. Slipped enough that his head hit the stage with full impact, knocking him completely unconscious. The sequence repeated itself, pausing at times, zooming in, lingering.

“That’s not it at all,” the guest joked.

Nino smirked, sitting next to Jun. “Aiba’s lucky he didn’t kill himself by accident.”

This time, the Aiba in his mind rotated, slipped, and hit his head on the stage – but instead of merely being unconscious, the impact popped open part of his skull, blood running out from the break under his hair and onto the floor.

And even though what Jun really saw were the bright lights and the faces of anonymous fans in front of him, in his head blood continued to pour out of Aiba. So much so that he silently commented on how it all seemed a bit excessive.

“MatsuJun?”

“Huh?” he said, looking over at Sho. Beside him it seemed that Aiba still had a case of the giggles, rubbing the back of his head.

The VIP segment had ended, and the guest had left the stage. Jun was perfectly programmed to politely stand and see her off with the rest of his group, even while he lingered in his own world of Aiba bleeding out. He didn’t feel like he had missed anything, but the others obviously felt like he had.

“Are you okay?” Ohno asked.

“Yeah.”

“You’re usually not that quiet,” he pointed out.

Jun gave a very small half-sneer and explained, nonchalantly, “Sorry, I was thinking about what would have happened if Aiba had hit his head on the floor when he tripped.” He paused. “A lot of bleeding, apparently.”

Aiba nodded, smile unwavering. “Good thing I didn’t hit my head.”

“That’s a little gruesome, isn’t it?” Sho chimed in.

“Yeah.” Jun started to take off his microphone pack to give it to the staff.

“It’s okay,” Nino replied. “Doesn’t everyone dream of killing off Aiba now and then?”

***

It wasn’t that Aiba bleeding out wasn’t unpleasant or that Jun failed to recognize the peculiarity of having such a thought – he didn’t welcome it at all. But he wasn’t shocked by it either.

 _I probably should be_ , he thought, as he flipped open his phone at the entrance of his apartment. He quickly typed out a message. _Want to go out tonight?_

Inside, Jun quietly called out, “I’m home.” It was a habit of his, one that he couldn’t break – not that he ever wanted to. It was a little lonely, a little sad – he had gotten grief over it several times from friends and coworkers. But he saw nothing wrong with habit in general and this time, there was actually something there to greet.

The stain. He hadn’t forgotten about it.

“You’re kidding me,” he muttered, appraising it again – it looked twice as big as before.

He pulled out the cleaner and a sponge, spritzing the carpet and waiting for it to soak in. “Where did you come from?” he muttered, looking up at the ceiling. No sign of leaking. The stain was isolated, so it was unlikely that it had been tracked in. He even tried sniffing it to see if it smelled like wine or tomato sauce, though the idea backfired on him – all he got was a whiff full of the sweetly floral carpet cleaner.

“It really should,” he said, as he started to scrub at the floor with the damp sponge. “The blood, I mean. It probably should bother me.” He paused to frown at the spot; habit or not, there was no point in having a conversation with it.

The image of spurting blood itself wasn’t enough to disturb him. It used to be, when he was younger, back when he was in elementary school and things scared him much more easily.

After all, he had spent an entire year avoiding rulers and scissors in the first grade.

“That’s the silliest thing I’ve ever heard,” his mother had said, crouching next to him.

“I’m not scared of them,” a younger Jun had explained.

“Then why won’t you use your ruler at school?” she had replied.

He had looked at her, face unwavering, and replied as if reciting an answer in class. “I might stab my eye out.”

“Jun.”

“I don’t want to,” he had insisted. “But what if I’m holding the ruler and I get sleepy and my head falls over or someone pushes me and I stab my eye with it?”

“Jun-”

“What if I’m in the car with a pair of scissors and we get hit and they go into my eye?”

She had given him a concerned look. “Why would you be holding scissors in the car? Why would you even think about that?”

The better question would have been _when_ did he think about such things. And the answer was every single time he was near either. The first time it popped into his head, he had cried, blaming it on something else. Soon thereafter, he just got used to the fact that seeing either tool would set in motion the vivid play of it becoming lodged in his eye, blood seeping out, maybe sometimes the eye itself coming out too. He had spent a lot of time as a youth wondering what he would do with a missing eye as it seemed an inevitable fate.

“I think you need to watch less television,” his mother had concluded.

Fate worse than death to a kid. “Mom,” he had protested.

“It’s not just that, Jun…”

Later that year he ran out into the street without paying attention and was hit by a car. It dragged him for a few minutes down the road before it stopped, ripping him open and landing him in the hospital, where he stayed for several months with an aftertaste of asphalt. Somehow, after that, the thought of a stabbed out eye was no longer upsetting – a lot of things were suddenly less scary.

Blood never really bothered him again, no matter where it came from.

And he knew it was never really the image of stabbing himself that was the issue either. It was that the thought came up at all.

In fact, imagining Aiba’s bleeding head at his feet earlier _had_ bothered him – not because he had just mentally killed a friend and coworker, but because he had never asked for the thought in the first place.

Jun caught himself scrubbing entirely too hard. The sponge was starting to break apart and leave bits on the carpet; it was probably too old and worn to have done much good anyway. The stain itself hadn’t diminished a bit. In fact, if anything, it looked bigger thanks to the large damp spot he had just made.

“Seriously?” he said, sighing and dropping the sponge to the side.

It was just as well; his phone beeped, indicating a new message.

Jun flipped it open and saw the reply from Nishikido Ryo: _Can’t tonight, busy – maybe tomorrow?_

***

He was just as tired when he walked into the Fuji TV studios the next day. After trying to use paper towels to scrub out the stain – which basically only succeeded in getting tiny shreds of paper all over his carpet, something he’d have to vacuum later – he had given up. It called for heavy duty cleaner. Heavy duty cleaner he’d have to buy after work.

Later.

Neither that decision nor the night at home, alone, had resulted in any rest, though.

The other members of Arashi were already gathered, waiting for make-up and wardrobe and in the midst of their pre-show routines. Which meant it was abysmally quiet as Sho read newspapers, Nino gamed himself into oblivion and Ohno quietly fiddled with something in the corner – apparently he had discovered the joy of making his own lures after a friend mentioned how easy it was.

The only noise, outside of the tiny clinking of the metal hook against the lure body as Ohno drew on it with a pencil, was Aiba’s occasional puff and grunt as he stretched. At times, their game show could be demanding, so warm-ups weren’t abnormal or unwarranted. Aiba was actually smart to always consider his health in that way.

Jun took a seat beside one of the larger vanity mirrors and made a face when he saw his reflection. The make-up artists were adept at hiding idol insomnia, but the rings around his eyes were worse than usual. And in his sleepy haze that morning, he had forgotten to grab something to entertain himself with during the wait.

“Huh,” Aiba said, stretching out his shoulder.

“You’re really noisy,” Nino remarked distractedly.

“It helps,” he replied. “The noise makes you stretch better.”

Jun couldn’t tell if he seriously thought that or was just talking out of his ass for Nino’s sake. And he couldn’t tell if Aiba started to make more noise as a result or if he was just now aware of each grunt thanks to Nino’s comment. Regardless, Jun continued to watch his friend’s reflection in the mirror as he squatted and turned, each noise grating on his nerves more and more.

What was worse, Jun thought, was that Aiba insisted on doing his stretches wrong. When he pulled his foot up behind him to stretch the quadriceps, he sloppily grabbed on to his toes instead of holding at the ankle.

Didn’t he know? He could easily pull on his foot too much and strain the quadriceps or, worse, pull too far and damage everything all together.

Jun heard a “pop” in his head as ligaments strained and finally snapped, leaving muscles sagging in skin, sloughing off from their proper positions into pools of limp flesh hanging at the knee. He had to blink; it wasn’t a pretty sight.

Aiba then took one hand to his chin and another to the top of his skull as he pushed on both ends to twist his head and cause a chain reaction, popping the small collection of vertebrae there. Then he switched the position of his hands and turned it the other direction.

What the hell was wrong with him? Thugs snapped necks doing the same thing. All he had to do was push it too far - not that he should have been doing it in the first place. Jun could see bone grinding on bone as Aiba decided to take it a little further and – snap – effectively sever his own spinal cord, falling into a dead-eyed heap of stupid muscle on the floor.

And what was worse – when Aiba had finally finished stretching, he started to crack his knuckles.

“That’s really annoying,” Nino commented again.

Jun agreed, cringing. With each crack he could see it – Aiba pushing the knuckle down so far that it caused the finger to break, a ragged end erupting and poking up out of flesh. He could feel the crunch – the small bones snapping apart. Even though he wasn’t that squeamish, Jun had to admit that the thought of breaking fingers wasn’t exactly pleasant.

“You’re going to do more damage than good if you can’t do them right,” Jun commented, irritated.

Aiba laughed. “This is the way I always do them.”

Jun slumped a little in his chair. “It’s sloppy – it pisses me off.”

The rest of the filming wasn’t much better for him - the imaginary injuries stayed in Jun’s mind, especially the broken fingers, even as he concentrated on his own participation. So much so that at one point in the day he had to quietly say to himself, “Is that really necessary?” while scowling at nothing in particular.

“Really?” Nino would sigh, leaning over to whisper every time Aiba bulldozed through a game.

Jun would shake his head slightly to loosen the thought, but then Aiba would go and open his mouth again.

By the time they were finished filming several episodes in a row, Jun couldn’t wait to get home and crawl into bed with a book. Any book – when he read, the words visually streamed through his mind and it made it that much easier to ignore everything else. He had the weekend coming with nothing scheduled – he’d get caught up on sleep and be back to normal in time for work next week. Back to normal and not nearly as tense.

“You look really tired,” Sho commented. He paused for a second, in thought. “Allergy season?”

Backstage, in their own personal room, Aiba couldn’t wait to change and started to pull his pants down halfway through the door.

“Aiba,” Nino complained, following him into the dressing room, “watch it, huh? We don’t need to see your dick.”

Jun bit his lip and clenched his fists, the very vivid image of Aiba’s erect penis hanging in the air. He didn’t have to use his imagination much – as long-time coworkers, seeing something like that was just part of the job. But did he have to see it now? Right there, magnified in his head and attached to Aiba and Aiba starting to hold it in his hand before very carefully moving his hand back and forth and-

“Thanks a lot, Nino,” Jun muttered, his shoulders hunched up around his neck. Inside, everyone was quietly and pleasantly back to their own spaces, their own routines. Aiba was changing like normal and everyone else was normal too.

But for Jun, Aiba’s blissful face and busy hands followed him around the room. He shot Nino another look.

Nino shrugged. “It’s Aiba’s fault,” he said. “You should have just killed him yesterday when you were thinking about it.”

***

By the time Jun got home, he had already texted Ryo four different times. First to find out if he was free, then to suggest that, with it being the weekend, that night would be a great night to go drinking. The third was an “okay” in response to Ryo’s, _Sorry, still working. Tonight’s no good_.

Ryo followed up with a, _Maybe later this weekend though?_

“Sounds good,” Jun said out loud, as he typed the characters into his phone and hit send.

His earlier plan of reading all night was quickly dashed the minute he bought the new cleaning solution. He had never needed such a thing before – the stains he usually accrued were always fixed by basic scrubbing. But once he read the instructions and opened the bottle, he was sure he’d never be able to spend the next hour, let alone the full night, in the same room.

Still, if it was as foolproof as the convenience girl had said it was, peace of mind was worth something that reeked like three year-old vinegar soaked gum. He would just have to go out with someone else since Ryo was tied up. But first things first.

And while he waited for the solution to work, Jun tried his best to not think about Aiba.

The problem was, whenever he tried to not think about something, it ended up being the only thing he could think of. The more he told himself to push out images of Aiba, ignore the tugging need to indulge in looking at bloodied scenery again, forget what he had witnessed earlier, banish everything about Aiba from his mind and absolutely abstain from taking anything further and spinning grotesque thoughts out into sequels and variations and remakes, the more Aiba occupied all of it – the more Aiba stood at each mental corner reminding him how hard it really was to run away from thoughts since the brain itself was like a sealed room.

The new cleaner didn’t seem to help at all and he reread the instructions, thinking maybe he had just missed something or wasn’t waiting long enough.

He started to cough. It was a given that he was now going to associate this smell with Aiba for at least a month or so. Bouncy, joyous Aiba would smell like three year-old vinegar soaked gum. Not sweat or animals or the non-smell he usually had; his face would just instead bring up this. And the urge to throw up.

Aiba was three year-old vinegar soaked gum.

Shriveled, lifeless skin that, once murdered, had been shoved into some cheap alcohol barrel to marinate until it was discovered some years later.

Jun shook his head. This wasn’t working – the stain just looked worse and now he was completely sick to his stomach.

He tossed the cleaner into his trash and took the trash immediately out, opened some windows and texted the next person he could think of. The reply came back fairly quickly – they were too busy that night too.

His grandmother used to swear by something, he remembered. She would at times chastise his mother for wasting money on products when she had successfully used just vinegar and water to clean things for years. Was it vinegar and water? That sounded right…

What more was a little vinegar in the air, anyway. Jun searched through his cabinets and behind all the bottles of oil found a small jug of white distilled.

His mother used to swear by something, too. It amazed him how he had grown up and turned into someone who delighted in taking risks since he had been such a timid little boy. Nothing quite compared to being run over by a car, he guessed, and some of it was the fear of mere youth. Still, he could remember what it was like before that year and how often he had made it a point to wake up his mother in the middle of the night.

“What is it?” she would sleepily ask.

“I’m scared.”

“What are you scared of?”

“I had a bad dream,” he would answer.

At first it didn’t seem out of the ordinary – every child went through a period of being unable to cope with occasional nightmares. His older sister had done the exact same thing.

But with Jun, it was different.

“It’s just a dream,” she would answer, rolling back over. “You’re okay, go back to sleep.”

“But I was awake.”

He would go back to bed. And he would lie with his eyes wide open, trying not to think about what monsters lurked in the dark. Trying not to think about what might be creeping up behind him. Trying not to think about what would happen if their place caught on fire in the middle of the night while everyone slept, burning them alive and choking them dead before they realized it, or if someone broke in and strangled his parents and his sister and finally him, or if he stopped breathing while he was asleep, which was the worst thought of all because he couldn’t for the life of him understand how people didn’t die before they woke up the next day.

“You’re watching entirely too much television,” his mother commented.

That wasn’t it.

“I just have bad thoughts,” he tried explaining once.

“Then think good thoughts,” she had answered. “You can’t have bad thoughts if you’re thinking good ones.”

She didn’t know. She couldn’t understand. For years Jun tried that – every time something scary or wrong crept inside and defiantly – gleefully – took over the tv channel of his mind, he would try to will it away. He would try to think of something more pleasant.

For every dark waking dream, he tried to push it stage left and replace the backdrop with yellow, sunny, bright golden fields. With animals and trees and most importantly the round circle of the sun purposely hung in the corner. And for a second, sometimes even longer, that’s what he thought about. If he really concentrated, it worked.

But the minute he let his guard down, thinking it was safe to try to sleep, lightning flashed and the sun melted away. There was the monster or the scary situation. Or worse yet, the bloody scene he never intended to view.

“Just think good thoughts.”

He’d tell himself over and over, _Think about the sunshine_ , and he tried to reach out for it and hold onto it like a stuffed animal. But he knew the only reason he did that was to block out the other thought in the process. And the mere understanding of that, no matter how much he tried to bury it away, gave power to the waking nightmare.

In the end, he’d sneak into someone else’s bed and try his hardest to think about anything else in the world until he finally fell asleep from sheer exhaustion. It was okay for very small children to do such a thing; at a point, though, it only ended up irritating everyone in his family.

At least after the car accident, it happened less. Then he’d just relive what it felt like to realize too late that something was coming and that something was going to hurt, a lot. He’d relive the blood and the pain and what he had already been through, what he had already survived. It wasn’t a pleasant thing to remember, but at least it was a memory. He couldn’t fault a memory from popping up now and again. At least _he_ had actually had it.

Not like a bad thought that put itself there.

Jun made a slight noise of disgust. He didn’t know if vinegar stained carpets, but it looked like that’s all he had accomplished with the white distilled. And, of course, now it just smelled worse.

He was tired of drowning in the worst kind of nostalgia and decided it was worth taking another break to try a few more people. He ended up texting almost everyone he knew – called a few. They were either busy or didn’t answer.

The problem itself was almost non-existent by the time he had entered the _jimusho_ , too. As a teen, he couldn’t afford to be scared by nightmares – he was too busy being scared by growing up and dealing with fame. And as a member of Arashi, there was just too much else to deal with. By then, he was so used to being hijacked that it didn’t warrant the attention. He sometimes found himself imagining his hands around Sakurai Sho’s throat when their dressing room was decorated in messy, scattered newspapers, but that was about it. And that was perfectly fine because it never lingered for long.

Jun sat on the floor of his apartment, the growing stain spread out between his splayed legs. “Maybe…bleach?” he said out loud. He knew it would just damage the color, but at that point he didn’t care. As long as it got the stupid fucking spot off of his floor.

He switched on the television for ambient noise and started hunting for bleach. As unhelpful as his mother’s advice had been, distraction was always welcome. Distraction was always wise. He was already listing off, out loud, which books he could read that night since it appeared he would be stuck with plan A after all.

 _Think good thoughts._

He was a pretty optimistic guy – he had to be – but he ended up resenting that line. Every time his mom said it, it just indicated to him that she didn’t understand. No matter how he explained it, she didn’t understand.

She simply didn’t know how really horrifying it was that he could never control his own mind.

That something else was always thinking for him.

Stupid visions of Aiba. He hadn’t been manipulated like this in a long time. And he didn’t like it.

At all.

The message tone on his cellphone rang out and he nearly knocked over the bleach to grab it.

 _Jun, sorry. I’m supposed to go to Osaka for the weekend, so that won’t work either. What about next week?_

***

On Monday, the NTV make-up artist assigned to them gasped when he came in and sat down with a heavy thump in one of her chairs.

“Morning,” he managed.

She was used to his muted personality when it came to mornings; she was certainly used to him coming in at times with dark rings or bags under his eyes – she had even seen him come in unshaven before.

But today, Matsumoto Jun looked worse than she had ever seen him. She mulled over where to start and decided the first thing would be the eyes. “Going for a new look?”

“Huh?” he asked before glancing to the side where Sho sat.

Sho could control his facial expressions when he wanted to, or exaggerate them just the same. At that moment, he felt no need to hide what he was thinking. “Bad weekend?”

Jun clicked his tongue. “I was in my apartment the entire time.”

Sho nodded.

“The entire weekend. By myself,” he finished. He looked back at the make-up artist. “Do you know how to get a stain out of your rug?”

“What kind of stain?” she asked.

“A bad one.”

She paused. “I have a dog at home so I use this little carpet cleaning machine. It usually works.”

“Can I borrow it?”

“Sakurai?” one of the assistants said, poking his head in.

“Coming,” Sho replied, hopping out of the chair and following.

“Oh my god,” the make-up artist blurted out.

“Hm?”

“Are you okay?” she asked, pointing to his hand.

Jun looked at it. He had always had nice fingers, well kept and slender – several people throughout his life had commented on how attractive they were. But on his right hand now, some of the nails were worn well down into the beds, with the raw pink underneath showing through where there wasn’t caked blood. Dried-out stains were on his fingertips and a few looked swollen.

“Did you slam it in a door?” she continued.

“Does it work?” he went on. “Because I need something stronger than bleach.”

In the break room, he found Nino up to his typical activities. Ohno wasn’t there and Sho obviously hadn’t finished with the assistant.

And Aiba…

For some reason Aiba was eating in the break room. Not a snack or a quick breakfast. He was eating a full-on whole meal right in the middle of their break room.

“Morning,” Aiba called when Jun walked in.

Jun didn’t respond. He just put his right hand behind his back.

“Annoying, isn’t it?” Nino commented. It was all he said, but Jun caught the drift. Eating in the break room was irritating.

And gross.

He sat between the two and tried his best to prepare for the show. He liked to mull over a few exercises, silently practice situations, to loosen up, make sure he was on his toes. But that morning it was impossible.

Jun kept glancing over at Aiba, hoping he’d finish eating soon. Whatever it was that he had, it was doused in some sort of sauce – maybe even ketchup. It was red enough like ketchup.

 _Or rather, red enough like blood_ , Jun caught himself thinking. _Blood, blood, blood blood blood – who puts ketchup on something like that anyway?_

Aiba had a bit smudged on the corner of his mouth, which was like a thread sticking out of a sweater. Jun wanted nothing more than to reach over and remove it – but not by wiping his face with a napkin. He just thought of the mess like a corner on a sheet, something he could pull back until everything was in its place.

“I’ve been here for fifteen minutes,” Nino spoke up, interrupting his thought process. “I’ve been listening to that. For fifteen minutes.”

To that? To that. The sound of chewing. There was no more disgusting sound on the planet than a human being chewing food. Jun _hated_ the sound of chewing. The sound of saliva rolling around in the mouth between ground up bits of food that no longer resembled anything but the precursor to compost – the smacking of cheeks rubbing continuously against teeth and the sucking of trying to free the last few particles out from underneath gumlines.

And Aiba was particularly loud when it came to eating.

Jun needed something to drown out the sound, as his own thoughts simply weren’t enough. Aiba wasn’t talking because he was eating – and Jun was certainly thankful that he didn’t have to deal with _seeing_ the chewed up food on top of everything else. Ohno and Sho still hadn’t come back. And Nino wasn’t putting forth any effort to fill the void.

“I was going to read this weekend, but I never got around to it,” Jun started.

Neither responded.

Jun sighed. “Actually, first I was going to go out, but everyone I called was busy. Which is kind of strange, isn’t it?” He looked around. “I mean, how could everyone be busy at the same time? I guess that happens when you call last minute. I probably could have called more but after a while it was just tiring. And obnoxious – I shouldn’t have to call up my third cousin to see if he wants to go out and eat. I’m pretty sure I called both of you. Well, actually, I just called Nino but… It was okay, I did some cleaning around my place. It really needed it. I guess I hadn’t cleaned it in a while. I also tried making something new.”

Neither responded.

Jun was starting to annoy himself, but he couldn’t stop either. “It’s this…well it’s hard to explain, but it takes a long time to prepare and I thought it would be a great weekend to try since I couldn’t get a hold of anyone. But,” he changed tone and started looking at memory instead of either companion, “I had this problem with the knife. The really big one? Maybe I need to sharpen it, I don't know, but it wasn't cutting right and halfway through I started to think, if it’s dull, what if I try to chop this too hard and I end up ramming it into my hand? Or the blade breaks and the tip lodges itself in my arm? But that was okay because at least it was my hand and not Aiba.”

“Aiba?” Nino said, looking over, finally interested. “Did you kill off Aiba again?”

“Yes, after that,” Jun said, without any hesitation. “At first it just went into his chest but then I thought about what would happen if I pulled it out slowly.”

“Lucky,” Nino commented, going back to his own interests. “I wouldn’t mind killing Aiba right now.”

“Okay,” Aiba replied, wiping his mouth, “I’m almost done. Next time I’ll bring some for you.”

“No thanks.”

“Stop trying to kill me,” Aiba joked, looking at Jun. “I’ll bring some for you, too.”

“Seriously,” Nino continued, “I’d rather die. So would Jun.”

Jun sighed.

And after filming, he was almost in tears.

“You should take a rest.”

Jun looked over his shoulder to see Nino standing there, looking slightly concerned. “I can’t.”

“Busy schedule?”

“No,” Jun started. “Have you ever had an itch that you can’t reach? And at first you think it’s okay, so you just ignore it. But the longer it goes on, the worse it feels until all you think about is how much it bothers you and how wonderful it would be to never itch again?”

Nino shrugged. “So scratch it.”

“…what?”

“If something’s bothering you, fix it,” Nino repeated.

“Get…rid of what’s bothering me?”

Nino nodded.

Jun smiled – for the first time that day. It was at first the blissful smile of relief, one that might have come with tears. But then it changed. A Cheshire smile like a cat who’s realized it’s time to play. “Good idea,” he said. “Good idea.”

***

Nishikido Ryo knocked on the door and started to move side to side, shifting his weight. “Jun,” he muttered. He tried again. “Jun, it’s fucking cold out here.”

He had sent a text earlier about finally having some free time. With the kind of work he had been putting in, alcohol sounded ideal. Besides, he felt bad about having to turn his friend down what seemed like seven times in a row. He thought that Jun would have jumped at the message, but he still hadn’t heard anything back.

Ryo hoped he was still free; if not, it was going to annoy him that he came all the way out to his apartment for nothing.

“Ju-” he started again, grabbing the door handle and opening the door. He was just going to rattle it to get his attention – he didn’t think the door would actually be unlocked. “I’m coming in,” he called.

He was barely in the entrance when the smell hit him, a reminder of dead fish, mold and detergent. “Are you cooking?” he called down the hall. “Is this a new recipe? Don’t bother keeping it.”

Ryo was laughing slightly as he came into the living room but the smile quickly faded from his lips. “Jun?”

In the middle of the floor was a large hole. Not just a hole in the carpeting, but the wood underneath was exposed and broken, revealing hidden metal piping and electrical wiring. The hole was enormous – Ryo could have stood in it. The carpet itself around the area was ragged as if it had been torn up. It was dirty and damp with some sort of stain, something dark that he didn’t recognize.

A few things had been knocked over; a picture had fallen down. The plant Jun kept in the corner of the room was rotting, tendrils limply hanging over the side of the pot and starting to fall off.

“Nishikido?” Jun called, coming out of his bedroom, smoothing his hands down on his pants.

“Jun,” Ryo replied. “What the hell happened?”

“Hm?” He looked around. “Just…fixing something.”

“By yourself? Doesn’t look like it’s going so well. Did you get my text?”

“No, sorry, I was busy. Hang on, let me change shirts.”

“It really stinks in here,” Ryo said, following him and watching him pull his shirt over his head as he walked. “Seriously, what the hell is that?” He turned the corner to where Jun’s bedroom was and stopped.

Slumped over the side of the bed was a body, a knife sticking out of the back and dried blood dribbled down the arm.

“Hm?” Jun said again, his shirt finally over his head. He turned around. “Oh, that’s Nino.” He tossed it to the side, where it landed with a soft thump on Nino’s lifeless head.

“He was driving me nuts, wouldn't shut up about Aiba,” he explained, pulling a new shirt out of the closet. Jun let out a sigh and smiled at Ryo, looking completely relieved. “Do you know? I slept so well last night.”


End file.
